X
THE COU?v-j
tlicm. A large and increasing mi
nority liuvc noted the timidity of city
treasurers and when the notices ar
rive they arc thrown into the waste
paper basket. This conduct is espec
ially characteristic of some of the city
and county olllccrs men who are paid
for their indilTercntly valuable ser
vices by the faithful contributions to
the common fund of widows and spin
sters, of commonplace, honest men
who havo not yet foresworn their ob
ligations to the community. In not
collecting these personal taxes as they
fall due the treasurer is making their
collection harder and ever harder.
For delinquent personal taxes draw
twelve per cent interest. .
Among the office holding classes,
there are men who do not pay their
taxes. They arc parasites draw
ing monthly salaries contributed
by the faithful many who have dis
charged their obligations to the com
munity. The many who have never
sought an office nor prated of their
love and duty to their fellow-men.
Fatriotism does not alone consist in
enlisting when the country goes to
war, nor American patriotism in mak
ing spread eagle speeches about the
privileges and duties of republican
citizenship. Fatriotism is the perform
ance of the every day duties of a citi
zen. It is a bad and insincere lover
of hie country who is willing to make
his living from the contributions to
tne common fund and who refuses
every year to add his own contribu-.
tions.
The laboring man works out his poll
tax on the road. The small merchant
who has never held out his suppliant
hands to the community for an office
pays his tax, the politicians of ' Lin
coln who are in request on Independ
ance day for speeches in the outlying
towns, pay no attention to the state
ment of their indebtedness sent them
from the treasurer's office. Owners of
realty pay taxes upon their holdings
In order to keep them free of incum
brance, but this tax on the personal
belongings of all and upon the poll
of the voter is moro especially a tax
levied by the community for the en
joyment of community blessings.
The man who refuses to liquidate it
does notcommit astatutory crime, but
ethically, he is a beggar who possesses
a competence and still begs. He has
no right to any emoluments or honors
conferred by the community that he
fastens himself upon. The delin
quents mentioned in the foregoing
were selected because either now or a
year ago a hypnotized community ac
cepted their assurances of love for the
people and elected them to represen
tative positions.
Washington Univmlty.
The Washington memorial associa
tion which has undertaken to raise
funds to establish a national univer
sity in Washington on the plan sug.
gested by the father of his country in
his last will and testament has recent
ly held its annual meeting and receiv
ed reports from its vice presidents in
the ditferent states. Mrs. Roebling
of New .Jersey reported that no money
had been contributed in that state
and suggested that the work be aban
doned and that the funds now in the
hands of the treasurer be devoted to
purchasing scholarships in unlversl
tics already established. Miss Daly
of Rhode Island said nothing had been
contributed there, but "a stray dollar
from Rhode Island found its way to
the treasurer of the association in
New York who sent it back to us and
we credited it. It came f rem Nancy
Lee." Mrs. Calvin S. Brlcc reported
that she had collected $100 for tho uni
versity In Ohio; Mrs. Mary Garrett
reported $1,107.03 from Pf .nsylvania;
Mrs. Coleman, $115.58 from Virginia.
Mrs. Slegel, $800 from Utah; Mrs. Mai
lory, $1,004.83 from New York. Mrs,
Julia B. Shattuck, chairman for Illi
nois, reported that one initiation fee
and the annua) dues of four members
had comprised her collections during
the year, and she tendered her resig
nation. Therefore 12,002.54 is all that
has been collected so far towards the
establishment of a university which
is to have a foundation of several mil
lions of dollars, but, notwithstanding
the discouraging lack of public inter
est reported from all quarters, the wo
men show no signs of despair.
The project !s not likely to succeed
unless some rich men endow it with
paltry millions. For millions are
paltry when compared with the needs
of a great university. In the progress
of the dissemination of learning it
seems to have been established that a
number of colleges scattered about
over the country give more light to a
greater number of people than a few
er number of large universities. The
memorial committee must solicit
funds from alumni of other colleges,
from mothers and fathers whose chil
dren are in some college. For univer
sity alumni are interested in the pros
perity of their alma mater and parents
are most interested in the schools
their children are attending. It is
thus difficult to collect funds from the
whole country for the building of a
college at Washington. It is perhaps
not too soon for all the members of
this committee to resign. The uni
versity will never be built by contri
butions from the states at large. Much
has been written about the advan
tages of a national university located
at Washington. The Smithsonian
institute the many government col
lections, and the congressional library
are of great educational value and
have never been made use of by a
body of students, but so long as the
per capita is no larger very few young
men and young women will go out
side of their own district for school
ing. This being so the small colleges
planted all over the United States are
doing immeasurably more good than
one larger one, and I have shown that
it is a question between them. The
income of the smaller colleges should
not be reduced by one dollar. Ma
homet who is represented by the col.
lege has'gone to the mountains, which
represents the people, who are in the
mass and in averages, as we are most
apt to consider them, immovable.
Shirk.
It is the immunity enjoyed by the
greatest beneficiaries of the 'commun
ity that exasperates men and creates
anarchists. We are supposed to be
living in a republic where the cost of
government is shared by all equally
and where the consent of the govern
ed is asked before the governing body
begins to govern. This is all a fiction.
It deceives nobody, not even Mr.
Bryan. In the first place half of the
population is women whose consent to
the laws and the men who administer
them has not been asked. Then the
president is not elected directly by
the vote of the other half of the peo
ple and senators are also elected in
directly. Democracy is only a name
and an oratorical fetich, something
which men pray to and adjure, but
which never answers their prayers. A
slight Investigation into the munici
pal machine of any city in the United
States discovers the governed" as the
prey of politicians clever enough to
evade their own obligations while
getting a living from taxes paid by
others. An honest man and a good
citizen who convinces himself that
treasurers are perfunctory, and are se
vere only with the comparatively
poor is less inclined to pay his taxes
thereafter. Further investigation in
to government by the consent of the
governed is likely to deepen his ten
dencies towards socialism and even
towards anarchy.
Peace on Earth.
Christmas is pre-eminently the -best
time forwlping out old scores. There
are certain reasons why it is necessary
to open another score book on January
first. The six days between should be
a period of good feeling. On the sec
ond day of the year 1900 the first
year of the new century the city
treasurer has said that he would col
lect the taxes or exhaust the legal ex
pedients granted him by the law for
the purpose of coercing those who
share in the benefits of community life
and neglect to pay their own assess
ment. But all this is to be forgotten
for six days while the world celebrates
the birthday of the Prince of Peace.
It is the children's week. For once in
the year the world is theirs. They
give much more than they receive.
Their cheerfulness, their abounding
satisfaction, their careless largess of
love to all, is the nearest a blazzy
world comes to happiness in the year's
round. The only really poor people
at Christmastime are those who have
no children in the house, or those
whom they bother. Such poor, de
serve condolence of unusual sincerity.
The children's eyes in these pre-Christ-mas
days are large with expectation of
mysterious benefactions from fairy
land. They are communing with be
ings whom we have forgotten, beings
whom the curtain of common sense
has long ago shut from our sight for
ever. And because of the immunity
of childhood, even the motherless, the
maimed and the hopelessly homely
and poor children share ih the mystery
and delight of the season. Upon none
of the pure in heart is the door shut.
And the laughter and sounds of
pleasaunce that reach our ears holden
by the years that divide us from them
are invitations worth while accepting.
HE PASSING SHOWS
W I LLA GATHER f
MMMMMMMMMIIIMIIIlI
When Frohman'sNew York Lyceum
company came to town presenting
Pinero's delightful comedy "Trelaw
ney of the Wells," about the most at
tractive person in the company was
Miss Olive May, formerly of Beatrice,
Nebraska, and sometime Mrs. Henry
Guy Carlton, That is saying a good
deal, for it was an excellent company
and in it some very exceptional people,
such as the dashing young William
Courtney, that beautiful Mary Man
ning, and John Mason, now fully re
covered from the baleful Influence of
light opera morphine and Marian
Manola, and doing the splendid work
that he is so capable of doing. The
The play of course offers rare oppor
tunities for good acting, and there is
not a part in it that is not full of in
dividuality and flavor. Of all the
living English play-wrights, 1 pin
my faith on Mr. Arthur W. Plnero.
He never writes a play unless ho has
something to say in it, and he never
says it other than effectually and ar
tistically. He has written, in "The
Second Mrs. Tanquray" one of the
strongest and most merciless dramas
of our time, and ho, has written some
of the most poetic 'and idyllic come"
dies. Since I saw his "Trelawney of
the Wells," I have believed in him
more completely than ever. The
play is tho least garish, tho mest dig
nified and un-theatric that I have
geen in many a long day, and it has a
literary flavor rare enough In these
degenerate times. Miss Trelawney,
the heroine of the piece, is the lead
ing lady at the Wells theatre, London,
and the plot of the play hinges on her
engagement to a London society
youth, her attempt and failure to
adapt herself to the hum-drum life of
his family and her return to the thea
tre to discover tlut she had lost the
trick of the florid declamation then
in vogue, and that having tried two
worlds she now belongs to neither,
and is neither a gentlewoman nor an
actress. Her lover himself goes upon
the stage and finally wins her In her
own world and among her own people.
The play is quiet, full of subtile ele
gance, and it reads almost as well as
it acts. The declamatory actors who
have outlived their period and who
are reduced to want by the new school
of naturalistic actors, form a pathetic
background for the story. And just
here, let me say that It is time to de
nounce the old fallacy that "plays
about actors don't go In America,'
since "Trelawney of the Wells" and
"Zaza"were the two most popular
plays in New York last year, and
Charles Coghlan's "Royal Box" held
its own for two seasons.
But to return to Olive May: she had,
after Miss Mannering, rather the best
part in the play, and I am inclined to
think that she made it quite the best
part. For Miss Mannering, although
her exqusite beauty is worth any
price of admission and her personality
is one of the most elusive and charm
ing behind the foot-lights today, has
always seemed to me a rather conven
tional actress. Miss May, on the
other hand, is clever to her finger tips,
and has animation enough for half-a-dozen
women and a pair of eyes that
tell very much more than her lines.
Indeed, she seems to have invented y
a system ot optic elocution of her own,
She is fairly bubbling over with that
vivacity which won her her first no
table success in "The Butterflies." I
suppose one might call it esprit, but
it is something more than that, for,
by her reading of some most unosten
tatious lines in the third act she
achieved the truest note of pathos
struck in the play, and I am told that
Miss Tyree, who first played the part,
made nothing at all of v those lines.
Miss May's "Avonia" is full of telling
technical "points," and her clear con
ception of the relation of the part to
the play shows, if I mistake not, ber
association with one of the cleverest
of our play-wrights. She seems to me
remarkably well equipped profession
ally, and she has that forerunner of
success, ambitious industry. The'
third act she makes practically her
own, and though she appears in it in
tights she does it sojdalntlly that it
never occurred to me that tights are
not the most conventional form ofW
dress. After the matinee I had a long f
talk with her at her hotel and found
her quite as young and as good to iook
at and as full of vivacity as when i
first met her four years ago. Her en
thusiasm for bicycling has been trans
ferred to golf, that is about the my
change. It interested mo to see now
stanch is lior loyalty to the West ana
how warmly she remembers herfrienw
there, and I got more Nebraska news
while tho Lyceum Company was in
town than I had heard since I ias;
crossed the Missouri. After dinner,
when wo left the Lincoln hotel for tne
theatre, the city was shrouded in
veil of smoke and fog, through wliicn
the lights in front of the theatre
burned-murklly, and she made m
usual protests against Pittspiire
weather. I remarked that wo bow
knew a country where the air
clear enough and where the wind wj
galloping forty miles an hour ove
terminable stretches of red-browy
prairie .r"
Yes," said Miss May "I remember.
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